SLAM WEEK: Skyhooks – Living In The 70s

Ah the 70’s, one of the few decades I genuinely wish I could have lived in. Of course though, I pretty much see it as a Forrest Gump montage; hippies, the cold war, drugs, civil rights and an amazing soundtrack. The Skyhooks’ first album Living in the 70’s however, paints a slightly different scene in my mind.

The Skyhooks brings it home, makes it relevant, especially with the help of my dad. He went to see the Skyhooks in the early 70’s before their debut album was even released (Firstly, I hope he wasn’t as drug-fueled as the band seems to come across). And no, it wasn’t even in the Palais Theatre so some amazing venue, it was some club in Frankston that he went to for a 21st birthday.

The Skyhooks have always had this awesome way of drawing in their audience, mostly through their dominant bass lines and glam-rock vibe. But as a Melbournian, there’s a little bit more there too.

The endless Melbourne references to places, events and suburbs makes the 70’s feel more like home, something more relatable. The opening track, taking it’s title from the album, paints the decade, or at least the first four years of it as drug-fueled excitement and confusion being “edgy”, “weird” and “like a schoolboy who’s grown a beard”.

If I had to choose one, my favorite track on the album would have to be You Just Like Me ‘Cos I’m Good In Bed. Oh the smugness, it’s really a song that can be translated across any generation. I love the drum fills, the passion, the rawness, and the fact that the lead singer’s girlfriend seems to think she could be Mick Jagger’s girlfriend.

It’s no secret that this – quite frankly, awesome album has lived down in infamy, having been inducted into the National Film and Sound Archive in the Sounds of Australia Registry last year. I personally love this album, not because I’ve been listening to it on repeat for the past week but because it’s always ended up being the soundtrack to family road trips.

The music, the drugs and the rock ‘n’ roll, the Skyhooks seems to bring it all home, literally. Now when I think of 70’s I see some high glam rockers wandering the streets of Melbourne, not LA or New York.